


Open for Business

by XantunsiaRiveresiana



Series: Gilberti Riveresiana Chronicles [10]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Assassins & Hitmen, Business, Gen, Introspection, It started as a joke between friends, Male Miqo'te (Final Fantasy XIV), Yes the name of our FC is The Wu-Tang Clan..., and now I have to work it into my RP..., comedy?, wu-tang clan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-17
Updated: 2020-04-17
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:40:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23701720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XantunsiaRiveresiana/pseuds/XantunsiaRiveresiana
Summary: Local bastard laments how he's the only fiscally responsible member of his family and decides entrepreneurship and murder are kinda the same thing
Series: Gilberti Riveresiana Chronicles [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1700908





	Open for Business

"If this is to be my punishment.... then never more have I regretted my sins than now..." Gilberti exhasperatedly muttered, as he held his head in his hands. He gazed painfully down at a book open at the desk he sat at, as if it was the source of his torture, a book with the word "BUDGET" written at the top of it.  
On the path towards some modicum of redemption, Gil had settled his accounts with the underworld, torn down a vast criminal empire, earned a pardon from the Kugane government, served time in prison, and for the most part, made up with the family he tried to kill.  
But this book was proving more a challenge than any of that.

"The bathwater from Yanxia, the healing runes, the food, utilities, the repairs, the other repairs, ...the repairs again." He dropped his pen and pinched the bridge of his nose thinking back on the people he was even doing this for, otherwise known as the main problem.  
Noir Panthere, while Gilberti's most begrudged clansmate, was also his most respected in the endeavor to bring in profits. She is skilled in a handful of crafts for sure, but most of her money simply comes from playing the markets. She's got a skill of working prices that he'd rarely seen in his black market merchant days. That being said, as well as she is able to hustle them, this source of income is still mostly at the will of the markets.  
"And this incredibly volatile hussle is our most consistent source of income...!" The Miqo'te complained to himself, now full gripping his face in his hands at the contemplation of his LEAST worrisome clansmate in terms of gil.  
Katya and Balalaika Rose. Newer members of the clan mother seemingly adopted, and while he didn't know much of them yet, he did know one thing, which is that they bring in exactly zero income. Neither seem to have a profitable skill and are more dependents than anything else as far as his book was concerned.  
Meanwhile, Nero Mugiwara was even more of a mystery. Katya and Bal he had at least met, but Nero had vanished long before Gil arrived. Seemingly on an espionage mission mother assures us he is surviving, the purpose of which is as unknown as whether or not he will return with any profit.

And then there is the woman herself  
The Leader of the Clan  
Xantunsia Riveresiana.  
Simultaneously the most profitable member of the clan and least cost effective. An absolute wildcard. As likely to earn ten-million gil killing a monster as she is to lead it through the bath house walls. Contemplating her contributions to the business, Gilberti cannot help but remember all her subtractions...  
"Perhaps you could simply rest between training sessions instead of using fifteen people's worth of healing water next time mother!"  
"Yes I know the point of the bath house is technically to bathe but do try not to track too much blood- it's burning- why is the blood burning through the floor?! DO NOT COME INSIDE WITH ACIDIC BLOOD ON YOU!!"  
"How did you even LEAD a warmachina into the middle of Shirogan- okay that's it, I'm fighting it with you!   
....  
DO NOT TELL ME TO STAY OUT OF IT WHEN HALF ITS ARM HAS CRASHED INTO MY LOBBY I'M FIGHTING IT WITH YOU!!!"  
Along with a handful of memories of the destruction his mother hath wrought, he also remembered that most of the money for their operation came from her. She'd made more money than she knew what to do with during her adventures and training, quite literally. She had to regularly be stopped from being swindled out of the millions of gil she had no concept of the value of.   
"We can't rely on mother's unstable wallet forever..." Gil frustratedly mumbled.  
For at the end there was him. The ex-(?)con, former blackmarketeer, and once upon a time merchant. And at the risk of sounding conceited, he was quite good at it. While this sounds like a nonexistent problem money making-wise at that point, the problem lied on his methods. Extortion, assassinations, corporate espionage and sabotage, he was a kind of one trick pony when it came to the methods of which he made money. Unfortunately, this new leaf of his made him swear off all such methods. And thus, was he stuck, staring at his book, wracking his brain to no end.  
"If I don't figure out some way to bring consistent money, who knows how suddenly we'll end up in the negative!" He burted out. He was finally out of places on his head to grip in frustration and ended up gripping the red pen in his hand too hard, crushing it. He stared at it for a second, swirling through thoughts, many unpleasant though nostalgic. The red dripping from his hand brought all that out of him until an idea appeared.  
"....negative.... yes... perhaps, double negative even..."   
He had sworn to change, and thus thought that meant swearing off his more negative methods of problem solving. But even a negative, if used on a negative, can make a positive. He frantically scribbled.  
"It would still be illegal... it would require safeguards... code talk, vetted clientele, investigations, but... but...!" He wrote faster  
"But there are monsters out there, that not the law, nor armies, that not even mother can touch with their methods...!" For the first time since he picked up that damn book, a smile found its way onto Gilberti's face. And not his porcelain salesman smile, but his genuine, twisted, bestial grin, as he continued to write  
"But I can!!" He yelled, dropping the pen, and after a few deep, satisfying breaths  
Closing the book.  
\---  
It was late afternoon in Shirogane as Gilberti sat at the front desk of The 36 Chambers' Bath house, trying to calmly watch the front as Xantunsia, and her guests played around downstairs carefree as ever. "Bathwater isn't for swimming...! No, no why are your weapons out you don't need- ohhh that's another lamp to replace..." he mumbled to himself, familiar with the sounds of their nonsense. He had done all the prep work, all the research, and spread word through the proper, or perhaps improper channels, and he knew it would take some time, but even so, it was taking longer to get a bit than he would have liked. Some had come for the baths, and some had tried the food, but between Mother simply giving away free passes to such things, and the additional damages from her escapades through those times, profit still hadn't come to the Chambers. Just as Gil started to lose his fight against the urge to check the budget book again and rethink his plan, the door opened, interrupting his doubt by prompting him to feign politeness and don his mask-like smile.  
"Welcome, how may I help... you?" He paused for just a moment, but didn't let it break his customer service appearance. The young au ran woman who entered was clearly nervous, clenching her arm with her left hand, an envelope with her right, and glancing all about rapidly. She was dressed in what effectively amounted to rags. Under those, though she seemed to be trying to hide them, were bruises around her body. She stuttered around it a moment, but eventually asked the question clearly present on her mind.  
"I-Is what they say t-true about... about Shaolin Shadowboxing...?" A fierceness breaking through the veil of nerves present in her.  
Gilberti slowly dropped his facade of a smile, and with a serious face replied "It sounds dangerous... but I practice the Wu-Tang Sword Style..."  
Though the color drained from her face as she heard this, the fierceness only grew and she marched up to the miqo'te, thrusting the folder towards him "d-do you think your Wu-Tang Sword can defeat him-!?" She began to loudly ask, but Gilberti shushed her as her voice raised, calmly grabbing the folder and looking through it. As he thought he would, he knew of the man it elaborated upon from his time dealing with the underworld. He knew of the suffering his operation caused, of how protected it was from law enforcement, and, more immediately important to him, how profitable pilfering from such a man's pockets would be.  
And all the more easy, and better for everyone, if he was dead.  
Gilberti closed the file after the brief glance he used to ascertain such benefits, and pushed the door to the back room open, a wide smile having found its way back to his face.  
"Come, we'll let him try my Wu-Tang Style."


End file.
